How I Got an ad job

The first step was deciding I wanted to be an ad creative. How I arrived at that would take a long time, but basically, I like being creative, making things, working with creative folks, and have a simple desire for health insurance. My next step was to make a weird website. It was about how bored I was, and therefore should be hired. I made videos, and stupid text things about what ad agencies were missing out on by not hiring me. It was resoundingly ineffective. Here’s one of the text things.

Next, and this took a surprising amount of time and failed attempts, I learned that one needed something called an ad portfolio, and typically made that in something called portfolio school. I couldn’t go to ad school because I already had debt and an equivalent degree from art school. So, I decided to just make an ad portfolio by night while I worked on a food truck by day, or sometimes the other way around. Here are some examples from what came to be my DIY portfolio.

I would also just put things on my site that felt like something between advertising and art. Like this.

At one point, I also did this weird stunt. It almost worked. It was definitely well received.

Anyway, I finally got hired. The whole thing was actually pretty hard and confusing but it worked out and I’m glad.